Retrieval of chromophore concentration changes in a digital human head model using analytical mean partial pathlengths of photons

Demián A. Vera; Héctor A. García; Nicolás A. Carbone; María Victoria Waks-Serra; Daniela I. Iriarte; Juan A. Pomarico

doi:10.1117/1.JBO.29.2.025004

28 February 2024 Retrieval of chromophore concentration changes in a digital human head model using analytical mean partial pathlengths of photons

Demián A. Vera, Héctor A. García, Nicolás A. Carbone, María Victoria Waks-Serra, Daniela I. Iriarte, Juan A. Pomarico

Author Affiliations +

Journal of Biomedical Optics, Vol. 29, Issue 2, 025004 (February 2024). https://doi.org/10.1117/1.JBO.29.2.025004

Abstract

Significance

Continuous-wave functional near-infrared spectroscopy has proved to be a valuable tool for assessing hemodynamic activity in the human brain in a non-invasively and inexpensive way. However, most of the current processing/analysis methods assume the head is a homogeneous medium, and hence do not appropriately correct for the signal coming from the scalp. This effect can be reduced by considering light propagation in a layered model of the human head, being the Monte Carlo (MC) simulations the gold standard to this end. However, this implies large computation times and demanding hardware capabilities.

Aim

In this work, we study the feasibility of replacing the homogeneous model and the MC simulations by means of analytical multilayered models, combining in this way, the speed and simplicity of implementation of the former with the robustness and accuracy of the latter.

Approach

Oxy- and deoxyhemoglobin (HbO and HbR, respectively) concentration changes were proposed in two different layers of a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-based meshed model of the human head, and then these changes were retrieved by means of (i) a typical homogeneous reconstruction and (ii) a theoretical layered reconstruction.

Results

Results suggest that the use of analytical models of light propagation in layered models outperforms the results obtained using traditional homogeneous reconstruction algorithms, providing much more accurate results for both, the extra- and the cerebral tissues. We also compare the analytical layered reconstruction with MC-based reconstructions, achieving similar degrees of accuracy, especially in the gray matter layer, but much faster (between 4 and 5 orders of magnitude).

Conclusions

We have successfully developed, implemented, and validated a method for retrieving chromophore concentration changes in the human brain, combining the simplicity and speed of the traditional homogeneous reconstruction algorithms with robustness and accuracy much more similar to those provided by MC simulations.

CC BY: © The Authors. Published by SPIE under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Distribution or reproduction of this work in whole or in part requires full attribution of the original publication, including its DOI.

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Demián A. Vera, Héctor A. García, Nicolás A. Carbone, María Victoria Waks-Serra, Daniela I. Iriarte, and Juan A. Pomarico "Retrieval of chromophore concentration changes in a digital human head model using analytical mean partial pathlengths of photons," Journal of Biomedical Optics 29(2), 025004 (28 February 2024). https://doi.org/10.1117/1.JBO.29.2.025004

Received: 20 September 2023; Accepted: 26 January 2024; Published: 28 February 2024

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KEYWORDS

Chromophores

Analytic models

Head

Absorption

Simulations

Sensors

Photons

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